February 10, 2004
LIVIN' ON A PRAYER
Plastic turkeys apparently breed faster than the regular kind. In the latest harvest of Gobble Theorists, we find Marc Perkel:
As if this would surprize anyone - the turkey Bush served the troops for Thanksgiving is FAKE! Everything about Bush is fake. What you're looking at is Bush serving the troops a PLASTIC turkey. But - its consistent. A fake turkey for a fake war served buy a fake president.
We live in a fake democracy with fake freedom. This is an example of what the Bush government is trying to feed us.
The picture is from the FAKE NEWS MEDIA who is trying to get us to believe the fake news.
Perkel bills himself as “the most dangerous mind on the internet”. All that danger evidently interferes with Perkel’s ability to spell, read, and learn. Step up to the carvery, David Sirota:
President George W. Bush actually held up a fake Turkey and used troops as a prop in a photo-op.
He held up an entire fake nation? Bush so strong! In a turkey moment from December 8, Slate’s William Saletan nominates himself, John Kerry, and Howard Dean for full Gobbler membership:
... the turkey Bush had held up in photographs was fake. I counted at least three candidates who worked the turkey angle into their speeches in Florida: John Kerry ("This president flies all the way to Baghdad to walk out and hold a fake turkey for a photo opportunity"), Wes Clark (who promised to go to Iraq with more than a "midnight turkey"), and Dean ("That is not the only fake turkey in this administration)." If Iraq remains a mess, expect to hear more next year about the turkey.
Iraq is a mess for the antiwar left. That's why we're still hearing so much about this fantastic bogus meal. Reader Tim S. sends word that during a recent appearance on the Dennis Miller Show (no transcript available), Jon Bon Jovi also joined the plastic turkey band; as Marc Perkel might say, we now have a fake rocker with fake hair telling fake stories about a fake bird. Rock on, Gobblers!
Posted by Tim Blair at February 10, 2004 01:41 PMA fake turkey for a fake war served buy (sic) a fake president.
What a jerkoff...
Posted by: Roger Bournival at February 10, 2004 at 01:57 PMThe Democratic Underground's 2004 slogan: 'Anyone But Bush'.
Like, anyone?
Posted by: ilibcc at February 10, 2004 at 02:20 PMilibcc,
Perhaps they should run Cheney instead, to pick up the DU vote.
Posted by: PNN Ed at February 10, 2004 at 02:24 PMMark Perkel used to write our local local newspaper on a regular basis as if he actually lived in southwest Missouri. They were your typical left-wing talking points, peppered with admonishment how hicks in the midwest are hicks or something. I expect he was mass-mailing small town newspapers who needed a more, ahem, left-wing tilt in their op-ed pages. Finally somebody decided to find out who he was and where he lived. San Francisco if I remember correctly.
I wonder how natives of SanFran would have enjoyed getting right-wing blather-rants from someone in my neck of the woods? Well, we'll never know because there isn't a chance that it would have ever made their papers but it is an interesting thought experiment.
Posted by: Brent at February 10, 2004 at 03:07 PMTim, the main reason we keep hearing about the Turkey (sic) is that you keep on bringing it up.
Lemme see. Real bird but fake weapons. Hmmm. Let's talk about the Bird as much as we possibly can!
Mind you, you're right about one thing: Iraq is a mess. Multiple choice: Whose fault is it:
a) the real/fake turkey
b) the "antiwar left"
c) the "pro-war left"
d) the "anti war right"
e) the "pro-war right"
f) none of the above - it was the turkey holding the turkey who's to blame.
Marc Perkel is a tight bud of Terry Coppage, a/k/a "Bartcop." In fact, I think Perkel's company hosts "Bartcop."
I think you get the picture now.
Posted by: Ryne McClaren at February 10, 2004 at 03:20 PMTim, the main reason we keep hearing about the Turkey (sic) is that you keep on bringing it up.
Yes, Nemesis, behind the scenes Tim is secretly feeding the fake turkey stories to hungry partisans who delight in repeating the fake turkey stories so Tim can call them out on the fake turkey stories. Thanks for clearing that up.
Glad to see you've gotten over your opposition to the war so that we can move forward on how to make Iraq a better pla... oh. Nevermind.
Posted by: Sortelli at February 10, 2004 at 03:31 PMTimbo, what about the Anti-right.
I don't give a toss about a turkey. I would like the US to at least have some idea of what they are doing in Iraq.
At present they are giving a good impression of completely ignoring what happened in Iran.
Please allow me. Nemesis, Sortelli thinks you are faulting Tim for public commenters repeating easily disprovable bullshit. Sortelli, Nemesis thinks that you mean that people who read this blog are the "we" you refer to, which clearly you are not. Grrrr, you lovable bastards!
Homer, as always, is challenging the conventions of punctuation. Get them Homer. Show them, how important it is. How else will they know.
Posted by: Dylan at February 10, 2004 at 04:25 PMNemesis, the left is placing the turkey front and centre more than Tim.
The plastic turkey is now an a fully canonized icon in the pantheon of left worship.
St Turkey, Patron Saint of Bush-Haters.
Posted by: ilibcc at February 10, 2004 at 04:26 PMOnly someone like Nemesis would think that it's Tim's fault that these morons keep repeating the same nonsense over and over. To quote Lileks, "Black is white! Up is down! Moore is less! Rall is funny!"
Posted by: Big Dog at February 10, 2004 at 05:51 PMI kinda like this "fake freedom" we have. It sure is different from the "REAL freedom" of Saddam though.....
Posted by: Dkissane at February 10, 2004 at 08:01 PMMultiple choice: Whose fault is it:
a) the real/fake turkey
b) the "antiwar left"
c) the "pro-war left"
d) the "anti war right"
e) the "pro-war right"
f) none of the above - it was the turkey holding the turkey who's to blame.
Let's try this again:
a) Saddam Hussein and his Baathist Party (pre-war)
b) Baathist Party remnants (post-war)
c) Non-Iraqi's who seek to re-impose a regime of gay-killing and women-bashing on Iraqi's (post-war)
d) Morally incompetent ankle-biters who long for the status quo of French, German, and Russian companies leeching off the nearly dead carcass of Iraq.
e) Morally incompetent ankle-biters who long for the status quo of unaccounted UN commissions on the Food-For-Palaces program.
f) Black Helicopter UN haters who despise Bush for enforcing 17 UNSC resolutions, thus saving the UN's credibility.
g) All of the above
Capice?
Posted by: Tongue Boy at February 11, 2004 at 12:02 AMShhh... Don't explain it to Nemesis. The bewildered look he gets when anyone responds to him is classic.
Posted by: Sortelli at February 11, 2004 at 03:03 AMIraq is a mess? Like it was the bastion of social utopia pre-war? Duh.
Nemesis moving the goalposts in 3...2...1
Posted by: mateo_g at February 11, 2004 at 08:31 AMGood thing it wasn't Bill Clinton with that turkey or they may have caught him on film with his pants around his ankles tickling that blow-up turkey's giblets. If you know what I mean?
Posted by: Fat Cracker at February 11, 2004 at 05:49 PMCan we please get past point-scoring and nit-picking? Although the US admin has clearly failed in it's general strategic plan, it is still possible to cement some moral gains.
But US-defenders need to come clean on the strategic stuff-ups.
And US-attackers need to acknowledge the possibility of moral progress.
Iraq was turned into a political mess by Husssein and his tribal clan.
Iraq was then turned into an economic mess by UN sanctions.
The US invasion is an attempt to clean up the mess, although it created some new ones in doing so.
The US started out well with the invasion, made some bad blues and are now lifting their game. Will they stay the course?
Here is a graphic showing some progress.
The authors of the chart have ambivalence about the current state of Iraq, with considerable trepidation about the consequences if the US should cut and run:
Almost all schools, courts and hospitals are open. But electricity production, telephone service and the availability of cooking and heating fuels are no better than they were before the invasion. Unemployment remains around 50 percent even if coalition forces have now helped create some 400,000 jobs. The Iraqi dinar is showing some strength, but a real economic recovery remains a distant prospect.
Against this backdrop, the coalition faces an enormous challenge as it tries to prepare the transition to Iraqi sovereignty this summer — and as it works to prevent growing anti-Americanism from fueling further violent resistance.
Iraq's messes may be worsened by theocrats moving in and the US moving out. It depends on the will of the US admin.
The Big Question: will the US admin revert to domestic Mayberry Machiavellians or turn into foreign Bismarkian Machiavellians?